Beacon Lesson Plan Library

Classroom Behavior Role Play

Jennifer Marshall

Description

Students analyze appropriate and inappropriate classroom behavior after listening to and discussing MISS NELSON IS MISSING by Harry Allard and James Marshall.

Objectives

The student listens for a variety of informational purposes, including curiosity, pleasure, getting directions, performing tasks, solving problems, and following rules.

The student carries on a conversation with another person, seeking answers and further explanations of the other's ideas through questioning and answering.

The student uses personal perspective in responding to a work of literature, such as relating characters and simple events in a story or biography to people or events in his or her own life.

Materials

- MISS NELSON IS MISSING by Harry Allard and James Marshall, Houghton Mifflin:Boston, 1985. This is an excellent book for demonstrating positive and negative classroom behaviors. It allows students to see when learning can take place, and it just might make them appreciate their teacher a little more.
- Role play descriptor sheets
- Chalkboard/overhead
- Stickers
- Drawing Paper and writing supplies

Preparations

1. Obtain a copy of the book.
2. Determine two sets of role play assignments, one for postive and one for negative classroom behaviors.
3. Gather materials-stickers, drawing paper, and writing supplies.

Procedures

1. Ask: Have you ever seen a class that would not behave for their teacher? What types of things did the class do? (Record their responses)

2. This book is about students who did not behave in their classroom. Read MISS NELSON IS MISSING to page 8 and direct students to listen for the negative behaviors in the class.

3. Add the negative behaviors found in Miss Nelson's class to the negative behaviors listed in #1.

4. Tell students: You are going to act as if you are in Miss Nelson's class, and you are going to do some of the same things that her students did. At the end of the role play, we will talk about how different classroom behaviors might have made learning different.

5. Assign half of the class to the role play as the other half observes. The role play assignments are: 2 students throwing paper back and forth, 2 students talking loudly, 2 students drawing pictures of the teacher, 2 students walking around the room, and 2 students asking questions without raising their hands. All of this occurs while the teacher is attempting to teach.

6. Discuss the roles with the students and enact the role play for several minutes.

7. Stop the role play and review some of the things that occured. Ask students if learning occured in this environment. Discuss what types of behaviors would have made learning easier for the students.

8. Brainstorm appropriate ways of behaving in the classroom during instruction.

9. Assign the other half of the class to re-enact the role play with the appropriate classroom behavior for several minutes.

10. Stop the role play and review the actions that occured. Could learning take place in this environment? Have students vote on which classroom they would rather learn in?

11. Read the remainder of the book and have students share situations they have experienced that are similar to the role play or the book.

12. Discuss positive and negative classroom behavior and reasons for demonstrating that type of behavior.

13. Students will create a drawing that demonstrates their ideal learning environment.

14. After completing the drawings, students will describe their designed classroom to their classmates.

Assessments

Each student that identifies a positive or negative behavior will get a sticker for participation. Each drawing will be collected after the student's presentation to see if the student demonstrated a classroom with either positive or negative behavior.